Letters to the Editor: For May 25, 2014

New York University professor of education Pedro Noguera got it right in his December 2013 article for The Nation. He wrote: “One of the greatest challenges facing American education today is a fancy, spun by billionaire — funded ‘think tanks,’ and often repeated uncritically by politicians and pundits, that our schools are failing, that teachers are shrinking their responsibilities and that unions are the root of the problem... That ‘reform’ is now associated with the crudest assaults on the very infrastructure of public education.”

I couldn’t agree more. The standardization of curriculum and admissions requirements, the proliferation of for-profit online education, and an array of unproven teaching and testing guidelines are just a few of the so-called reforms sanctioned by state education commissioners, campus administrators and lawmakers. With the states’ push for austerity budgets, and the resultant disinvestment in public education, the doors to institutions such as SUNY have been thrown wide open to for-profit companies.

I’m left to question if these stepping-stones to privatization have anything to do with improving education.

Advertisement

The most recent assault on public education is playing out largely in New York, where the state Education Department (SED) is requiring sweeping changes in teacher education programs.

SED Commissioner John King Jr. has taken New York’s changes a step further than his counterparts in other states, particularly with regard to the edTPA, a new student-teacher performance assessment. Where other states are involving educators in implementing the stricter guidelines and have delayed making the edTPA as a requirement for certification — which isn’t too much to ask since SED has said up to 40 percent of students will fail the new exam. What does Commissioner King expect, when newly appointed edTPA coordinators have not had adequate time to design guidance and information programs for faculty, teacher candidates and school districts? Lets face it: If you’re going to require a test for certification, it only seems fair to give educators time to incorporate the new materials into their curricula.

But even more troubling to me is that for a for-profit corporation, Pearson Inc., has its hand in nearly every facet of education reform. The company had a role in creating the Common Core State Standards, along with other philanthropic and corporate donators, a few governors, and some educators dubbed “ lead architects”. The company has been contracted by New York to deliver and score standardized exams to K-12 students. Those exam results are being used to assess teacher performance; that is, how well teachers have implemented the standards manufactured by Pearson and others.

Pearson is now trying to strengthen its foothold in higher education; the company designed and owns the edTPA delivery system and will preform all the scoring and reporting of edTPA exams.

That’s the same Pearson that operates the not-for-profit Pearson Charitable Foundation, which in December 2013 agreed to a $7.7 million settlement with the office of the New York attorney general. The settlement came after state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman levied accusations that the foundation had a hand in developing profit-making course materials aligned with the Common Core State Standards, requirements that regulate math and language art skills taught to K-12 students. The investigation by state DA’s Charities Bureau also revealed that Pearson used the foundation’s charitable assets to help fund school officials’ participation in a series of international conferences on education. Pearon’s sales personnel were the only for-profit education company employees to attend.

A $7.7 million settlement is a drop in the bucket for Pearson, a multibillion dollar company that as of May 2012 had contracts with 18 states, Washington, D.C. and Puerto Rico, including a contract with Texas that topped $500 million. New York has entered into contracts with Pearson totaling more than $40 million since 2010, including nearly $35 million over five years to develop state assessments. But even if the money trail and business practices weren’t suspect, Pearson’s product is. Pearson’s performance to date has been marginal at best. In April, 2013, nearly 2,700 New York City K-3 students were told that they were not eligible to enroll in the gifted and talented programs. But they were eligible; Pearson incorrect recording of students’ ages; using the wrong scoring tables; and an inaccurate ranking formula.

Despite the growing evidence that, for Pearson, profitability trumps educational quality, the corporation continues to have the inside track to standardized testing and assessment — without parental, educational or governmental oversight.

Something just ain’t right here. I urge everyone to call their legislators and tell them,” Enough is enough.” There’s too much at stake to sit back and do nothing.